Fatherhood

He was going to ask again. She could feel it in the way he pulled her more firmly against him, wrapping the covers around them both. He buried his face in her hair, breathed her in, kissed the crown of her head. This dance was the preamble. Placing a finger under her chin, he tilted her reluctant face towards his, open and hopeful.

“I love you, Grace,” he said.

As he breathed in for the question that followed, she abruptly took his mouth into hers, stealing his air. As one, they rolled until she was on top of him. Her auburn locks fell tangled around their faces as she bit his bottom lip. They were already naked and it didn’t take long. He knew it was a distraction.

“Coffee,” she murmured into his shoulder afterwards, rolling out of bed. She picked a t-shirt off the floor, last night’s shed skin, and grabbed a pair of underwear from the top drawer. As she pulled them on, she caught his eye – full of hurt, and longing. She pulled her phone from the charger and left, closing the bedroom door behind her.

She was pleased to find an unopened coffee can on the counter. She pulled back the plastic lid, inhaling in the earthy scent of fresh grounds.

As the coffee machine gurgled, she took a seat at the small kitchen table against the bay window, a suburban street full of Saturday mornings unveiled before her. She started to scan her phone and a message appeared—a reminder to call Nana today.

“It didn’t work,” he said. She’d been so absorbed in her phone, she didn’t hear him come out of the bedroom. Wearing a pair of plaid boxers and blue socks, his hair mussed perfectly, he was a vision—tall and lean, olive-skinned. His heavily-lashed blue eyes looks steely, angry.

“What didn’t work?” she asked, returning to her phone. “Coffee’s in the pot. Pour me a cup?”

He sat down at the small table across from her, ignoring the request. Morning light from the bay window highlighted the pale, thick scar on his left shoulder.

“Your diversion attempt,” he said sharply. “We need to talk about this, Grace. I’m sorry you don’t want to, but it’s important to me.”

Grace sighed and placed her phone on the table. “I don’t know what there is to talk about,” she said, rising and walking into the kitchen. She pulled two mugs from the cabinet and turned to look at him across the kitchen island.

“I understand you’re not ready, but I need to know why,” he said. His eyes had lost the steel, left confusion and sadness in its wake.

Grace filled the mugs and took the milk from the fridge. She mixed his with two teaspoons of sugar and a dash of milk. She returned to the table, placed the cups in front of them. Hers, black; his, pale and sweet.

“I don’t know if I can answer that,” she lied. “I just know I’m not ready.”

“When will you be ready?” he asked. This circular conversation was so familiar, it had become a sick role-play.

“Chuck, you know I can’t answer that.”

He rose and retraced her steps in to the kitchen, snatching the milk off the counter. He jerked open the fridge door and replaced the carton.

“Don’t leave the milk on the fucking counter, Grace,” he spat.

And just like that, the performance ended as it always did: with him angry and her leaving. She took a first and last sip of her coffee, then went into the bedroom to slip on some sweatpants. She grabbed the car keys from the kitchen island and slipped on her crocs in the foyer. As she shut the door behind her, she heard him say, “Grace, wait.”

The morning air still had a bite of winter, but it would burn off by mid-morning. Grace climbed into the creaking Four Runner and cranked the engine. With no destination in mind, she took a left out of the driveway. She could feel Chuck’s eyes on her from the bay window.

It was Sunday, so she had nowhere to be for a few hours. She had a short list of activities that always followed these arguments. Her favorite, musty-smelling bookstore downtown, wasn’t open yet. Depending on what time their argument concluded, Grace would sometimes belly up to the neighborhood bar a few blocks from their house, but Chuck had started to find her there. It was too close to home. Plus, things hadn’t gotten bad enough to start drinking in the morning. Yet.

It was a perfect morning for her third and final option: a visit to the dog park. It wasn’t just a dog park – people without dogs went there, too, so Grace didn’t feel out of place. Chuck was allergic to dogs and had offered to get her a hypoallergenic puppy, but she declined. She’d always wanted a big, hard-to-identify mutt from the pound. Maybe one of those “Who Rescued Who?” decals for the back window of the Four Runner. A labradoodle just wouldn’t be the same.

Instead, they compromised with Max, a fat orange tabby cat who had perfected the art of disinterested feline. He lay warm and heavy on her lap when they watched TV at night, but other than that, Grace could nearly forget he was there.

The dog park was across town, so Grace merged onto the highway. Traffic was light. She glanced sidelong at the other drivers in neighboring lanes, trying to guess what put them on I-80 at 7:30 a.m. on a Saturday. Most were laborers – those for whom a Saturday was just another weekday. She caught sight of one young girl in an ancient Volvo. Her silver dress, glazed eyes and mussed hair harkened of a long night. Grace peeked at her again and saw a pair of strappy platform heels in the passenger’s seat. Smiling to herself, Grace merged the Four Runner into the exit lane.

The dog park’s location, this far from home, was very important. If Chuck ever found out about her secret, feel-good trips here, he’d show up at their door with a puppy that same day. He’d be convinced that a poodle was the answer to their problems; that a puppy to care for would trigger some domestic instinct in Grace and leave her begging for a white wedding and a house full of babies. Grace kept a lint roller and perfume in the car, to erase any evidence of her visits.

Grace pulled into a spot and cut the engine. She sighed, leaning her head back against the seat. This wasn’t the dog park. She wanted to go to the dog park.

She stepped through the pharmacy’s automatic doors. They sealed shut behind her. A bored, middle-aged woman behind the registers gave her a flat hello. The dog park would be packed right now – lots of wet, furry snouts with happy, waggling tongues. Retrievers and terriers and bull dogs and hounds.

Oral Care. Cosmetics. Foot Care. First Aid. Family Planning. As she stepped away from the entrance, the automatic doors opened again, releasing a waft of cool, fresh air. Some of the smaller dogs would be wearing sweaters and jackets this morning. The door shut once more, sealing her inside.

The air was sterile, the lights too bright. She turned down the aisle and scanned the rows of boxes, looking for a signature bright pink one she’d purchased once before—a different pharmacy, a different city. A different life.

She found it, tucked away on the bottom shelf. She bought a pack of gum and a water bottle, too, smiling at the deadpan cashier. She headed for the automatic doors, bracing herself for the welcome release, then stopped.

“Can I use your bathroom?” she asked. She certainly couldn’t do this at home.

The morose cashier shrugged and pointed wordlessly to the back corner of the store.

The bathroom was single-stall, thankfully. Grace locked the door behind her and unwrapped the pink packaging. A quick glance at the instructions told her that, despite all that had changed in the past decade, this process was the same. Women were still subject to the unique humiliation of peeing on a stick.

She closed the toilet seat and sat down. Within seconds, a second blue line appeared in the plastic window of the test, confirming what she’d known for weeks. She sighed and tossed the test into the trash.

She pulled out her phone and scrolled through the contacts to find Greg’s number. A father had a right to know.